Lino Print update!

I really got stuck into the lino printing last week, finishing off the final layer of my first lino cut and then starting a second cut. I love the way you can just zone out whilst you are carving, it's almost more fun than seeing the printed results. I spend a lot of my time window gazing so I decided to use images that I'm faced with nearly everyday, as a way to re-assess these great views that I've stopped seeing due to over familiarity.


Window Gazing no1 by Emma Kaiser is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.

Window Gazing no2 by Emma Kaiser is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.

I've embraced chance, which I must say is sometimes rather frustration as things don't always go as expected but on the up side the unusual results are proving to be the most interesting! Layering two prints of white looks awful at the second print stage but once I added the black final layer, the white works to create a beautiful shadowy effect. The same goes for sandwiching a layer of white in between the green and black, I was expecting the black to obliterate the white completely but thanks to my dodgy registration technique having the top layer slightly off set had turned out for the best.


Window Gazing no3 by Emma Kaiser is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.



Window Gazing no4 by Emma Kaiser is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.

My personal favorite is the two layers of green finished with black. When I first mixed the light green I thought to my self, 'there is no way that that is a natural colour' however on my drive home I noticed a field that was almost that exact colour, with the sun shining on it after a sudden down pour! The two greens work best together because they are significantly different, on some of the prints where the two greens have been close in shade the textural quality of the print has been lost. I have to say that what I like best about printing in this way is the scummbly texture left by the ink on the paper. I used the etching press today to print for my lino and that effect was totaly lost due to the pressure it applies. It also highlighted some of my carving mistakes, where I hadn't cut deep enough and some rough edges! What did happen though that was quite exciting was an embossing effect. Tomorrow when my lino is dry I'm going to try and emboss my image onto a blank piece of paper, without any ink, giving my a textured paper to work with.


Window Gazing no5 by Emma Kaiser is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.


Window Gazing no6 by Emma Kaiser is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.

Hello is there anybody out there!

Well hello all you people in cyberspace! I'm here to empty my head of all the random and crazy thoughts that keep flashing through my brain. This week I have mostly been thinking about... Print Making.
After some initial attempts at lino printing I eventually managed to produce some layered colour prints that I am happy with.

These are just some of the tests I made, showing the first and second print stage. I have one more layer to print adding the third colour. At this point I'm experimenting with layering from dark to light and vice versa. We will see what works out best after I have printed the last layer.